Danish Drug Policy— An Ambivalent Balance between Repression and Welfare

Lau Laursen and Jorgen Jepsen
Additional contact information
Lau Laursen: Centre for Alcohol and Drug Research, University of Aarhus
Jorgen Jepsen: University of Aarhus

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2002, vol. 582, issue 1, 20-36

Abstract: This article maps recent developments in drug policy in Denmark: control, treatment, prevention, and harm reduction. Prevailing issues have been the introduction of a Danish heroin experiment, injection rooms and other harm reduction measures, moral panics around street level phenomena, and a renewed discussion of the relative roles of law enforcement and treatment/harm reduction. The power positions of the actors--police, politicians, administrators, and users' representatives--have shifted over time. A covert conflict between the Ministry of Social Affairs and the Ministry of Health has resulted in an uneasy balance on the political and policy level and confusion about guidelines and practices. There have been oscillations between optimism and pessimism in the law enforcement and treatment sectors. Ritualistic invocations of prohibition, prevention, and treatment coupled with ideological opposition have not been able to stem increasing acceptance of harm reduction--a modified version of the Scandinavian welfare approach.

Date: 2002
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/000271620258200102 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:582:y:2002:i:1:p:20-36

DOI: 10.1177/000271620258200102

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().